


Brave (Because You Wear a Mask)

by Piscaria



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Cunnilingus, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Semi-Public Sex, post season two
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-22
Updated: 2012-11-22
Packaged: 2017-11-19 06:25:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/570196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piscaria/pseuds/Piscaria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the months after her mother's death, Allison stalks Derek, grows closer to Lydia, and tries not to think about Scott.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Brave (Because You Wear a Mask)

**Author's Note:**

> This goes out to all the wonderful people who participated in TW_FallHarvest! Your stories and art have been a joy this season.
> 
> Two wonderful people share beta credit on this story. You guys know who you are. Thank you. <3
> 
> Warnings: Canonical death of a secondary character; grief.

Allison found it in the jumble of odds and ends that had fallen from various costumes and landed on the floor of the Halloween store. She didn’t know why she started sorting through the pile in the first place. 

“They have employees for that!” Lydia always said, whenever Allison started straightening the displays while they were out shopping together. “You can’t fix your family, so you’re trying to fix everything else to compensate.” 

But Lydia was deeply involved in her own reflection, craning her head over her shoulder to admire the iridescent butterfly wings she’d strapped on, so there was nobody to stop Allison from kneeling beside the display’s baseboard and sorting through the mess of costume components. She slipped the plastic pistol back into the harness of a cowboy costume, and hung a plastic Iron Man mask back onto the hanger that held the rest of the armor. Allison was trying to figure out how attach Tinkerbell’s wand back to her leaf-green dress when her eyes fell on the tip of a gray nose poking out from behind a rubber Frankenstein mask. Forgetting the wand, Allison touched her hand to the soft fur, swallowing hard.

It was a wolf’s mask, all sharp ears and sleek snout, designed to cover the top half of the face. She couldn’t tell where it had come from — no wolf costumes hung in this rack. Cradling the mask in her hands, Allison rose to her feet, trying to calm the rapid-fire beating of her heart. She turned to the mirror where Lydia had been standing. Lydia was gone now. Allison could only see her own reflection, wan and pinched. She wanted to attribute that to the store’s fluorescent lights, but she knew better. Her eyes were always shadowed these days, no matter how much concealer she caked on in the mornings. Her cheekbones were a little too sharp, her skin a bit too pale. 

“I can’t stand my own cooking,” she always laughed, when people mentioned the weight she’d lost over the summer. That usually shut them up. Nobody wanted to talk about her mom dying. But the truth was, Allison’s mom had hardly cooked at all. It was her dad who’d grown up shadowing Gerard in the kitchen, her dad who still set out a third plate at every dinner, pouring an offering of wine into her mother’s empty glass. Allison wasn’t sure if he drank it himself before going to bed at night, or if he poured it down the sink. She never waited around to find out. So no, Allison wasn’t doing much in the way of cooking. It was just that all of her food tasted like dirt these days, like the first shovelful she’d scooped onto her mother’s grave.

In one sharp movement, Allison slipped the elastic band behind her braided bun, settling the wolf mask over her face. Her lips curved into a smile beneath the wolf’s nose, and something shivered down her spine, electric. The smile looked dangerous. Predatory. 

A flash of movement in the mirror caught her eye, and Allison turned to see Lydia studying her, hands on her hips and head cocked to one side. Allison couldn’t read Lydia’s expression. But when Lydia said, “Stay right here,” Allison obeyed, tilting her head in the mirror to admire the wolf’s snout in profile. She stepped her feet shoulder-width apart, straightening her shoulders. This was how she would stand to steady a crossbow. But now she wasn’t a hunter. She was a wolf. She ran her tongue over the edge of her flat, human teeth, and tried not to think about that one time Scott had nipped at her collarbone with his fangs when he came. He’d spent an hour afterwards just running his fingertips over the shallow wound and reassuring her that she wouldn’t turn from it, he wasn’t an Alpha. Allison had known that already from her father’s lessons, but she’d rested her head on Scott’s chest and soaked up his attention, feeling sleepy, and sated, and loved. 

If Scott had bitten her mother, instead of Derek Hale, then she would probably still be alive. But if her mother was alive, then Scott might not be. 

When Lydia returned, she wore a red velvet cloak and a gleam in her eye. She pressed in close to Allison, wrapping her arms around her from behind so that the folds of the cloak fell over Allison’s shoulders, and the clouds of her perfume wrapped around them both.

“My, what hot legs you have,” Lydia breathed, then giggled, smoothing down the sides of her cloak. “How about it?” Lydia asked. “Jackson will go crazy!”

Allison bared her teeth at the mirror. “Okay,” she said.

* * *

Allison had spent most of the summer planning how to kill Derek Hale. 

She didn’t blame Hale for her mother’s death, at least, not entirely. Allison knew now that her mother had tried to kill Scott, that Hale had been protecting him. But anger still burned inside of Allison, white-hot. Even watching Gerard die at the warehouse hadn’t been enough to snuff it out. Of all the people she could focus her rage on, Hale was the easiest — he was the only one she’d never loved.

She’d spent all of July watching Hale skulk around town in his black leather jacket. She watched him visit the barber’s and the grocery store, drop Isaac off at the lacrosse field or at Scott’s place, move from the train station to the old Hale house, or just sit in the cemetery surrounded by the graves of his family. It was at the cemetery, he finally caught her. She’d slipped up there, distracted: all of the old Beacon Hills families had plots in the west side of the cemetery, where the view was best, and the pristine grass that grew over the dead Hales was only a few feet away from the more recently established sod that blanketed the Argents. Hale’s eyes had met Allison’s over the gravestones separating them. His frown deepened when she leveled her crossbow at him, but he made no move to run or attack, and part of Allison wondered whether he would even dodge the arrow if she fired.

 _I hate you_ , Allison wanted to say. But her throat closed around the words when she tried to speak, in the space of time it took her to lift one hand from the crossbow and scrub away the tears blinding her, Hale had vanished.

Allison didn’t know if her father had followed her to the graveyard, or if Hale had said something to him. Whatever the reason, Allison’s father asked her to join him in the living room after dinner. She folded her knees underneath her on the sofa, feeling unaccountably nervous. Her father stepped into his office for a moment, and returned with a book bound in honey-colored leather. The cover bore a wolf embossed on the leather, a star above it, three chains below. Allison recognized it immediately. 

“This was your aunt’s scrapbook,” her father said, something haunted in his expression. “I want you to have it.”

Her hands trembled as she took it. The spice of dried wolfsane rose from the pages. At first, she couldn’t see what she was supposed to be looking for. Each page was a jumble of photographs and newspaper clippings dated from Allison’s childhood. But her father stood behind her with a hand on her shoulder, so she turned each page methodically until she came across the photo of a boy green-eyed boy smiling shyly up at her. It took her a second to recognize him. 

Derek Hale had been thinner in high school, his shoulders only just beginning to broaden, his limbs a little too long. Even so, she would have recognized him more quickly without the smile. It was shy and painfully open as he looked up at the camera over the rim of a wine glass, wearing a sweater that brought out the green in his eyes. There were two other photos of Hale on the page. In one, he was climbing, dripping, from the school pool, laughing at something Allison couldn’t see. In the other, he perched nervously on the edge of a bed, dressed only in a pair of white briefs. Aside from those three photographs, the page held only a clipping from an article about the fire at the Hale house, with a red lipstick kiss pressed over the yellowing newsprint as if it were a love note. 

Allison snapped the scrapbook shut, but she could never erase the memory of Hale’s shy, hopeful smile, no matter how much she tried. He smiled like he’d spent his life in darkness, but whoever held the camera had bathed his whole world in golden light. Scott used to smile at Allison that way.

That night, Allison placed the scrapbook in the box that held her awful poetry, paintings, and photographs, all the identities she’d tried on and off over the years. She disassembled her crossbow and hid the pieces under her bed. Then she texted Lydia and asked if she wanted to go to Macy’s. She didn’t expect and answer — they hadn’t seen each other since the warehouse, and she knew Lydia was still mad at her for keeping the werewolf thing a secret. Privately, Allison had already counted Lydia amongst the scores of friends she’d lost during her many moves. But fifteen minutes later, her phone chirped.

 **Finally, bitch!** Lydia replied.

Twenty minutes later, Jackson’s Porsche pulled up to the curb outside her house; Lydia stepped out of the driver’s seat and swept Allison into a hug.

They talked about werewolves. They talked about secrets. They talked about love, and about broken hearts. They never made it to Macy’s that night, but it was all right — “Black works for you,” Lydia said, when Allison opened her closet to show her the remains of her wardrobe.

“Did I fuck everything up?” Allison asked.

Lydia sighed, and twirled the key she wore around her neck. “Your aunt fucked things up,” she said finally, in the same confident voice she used to answer questions in class. “We just got caught in the fall out.”

After midnight and three glasses of the wine, Allison got brave enough to show Lydia the series of texts (all 118 of them) she’d gotten from Scott over the summer.

“Damn, Allison, just put the poor boy out of his misery,” Lydia said.

Allison couldn’t find the words to explain it, even to herself. She still loved Scott as much as ever, but that love had gotten tangled into a knot of grief, and fear, and anger, and Allison couldn’t find a way to tease it free. 

When school began, Allison avoided Scott, refused to catch his eyes. At lunch, she sat with Lydia, Jackson, and Danny, with the clique they somehow managed to draw around themselves again. Allison carefully didn’t look across the cafeteria, where Scott sits with Stiles and Isaac — when Jackson asked if she wanted to know what they were saying, she shook her head.

From Lydia, she knew Jackson trained with Hale, that he chafed at ceding power to an Alpha, but couldn’t bring himself to join Scott’s pack. However, Jackson never said any of this directly to Allison, and she was grateful for it. She liked her knowledge of Scott to come third-hand, through Lydia — Scott made up his credits during summer school and was back on first line; Scott fought with one of the new Alphas, but managed to survive; Scott asked Cecilia Ambriz to go to Homecoming, and she said yes.

That day, Allison told herself she was over Scott McCall for good.

She only gave into temptation once. It was the same week she learned about Scott’s homecoming date, the same day she’d marched up to Greenburg in gym and asked if he wanted to go with her. (Coincidentally, Scott had been standing behind Greenburg, but that had nothing to do with Allison’s timing, no matter what Lydia said. Maybe Allison just appreciated a man in gym shorts.) Allison was driving home from school, and for some reason she couldn’t name, decided to drive past Scott’s house.

He stood amidst the fire of red and gold leaves on his lawn, holding a rake in his hand. She’d had her coffee cup to her mouth and was taking a sip when Scott’s eyes met hers. She swallowed, nearly choked on her pumpkin latte. She wasn’t a werewolf, but even she could hear the sudden, traitorous thunder of her heart. Scott wore a gray sweater that looked like it would be warm and soft under her hands. The air smelled like smoke and apples. 

After a moment, Scott lifted a hand and waved at her, tentative. She blinked back tears as she returned it, wondering if there would ever come a time when seeing Scott won’t make her heart ache. 

“I still love him,” she sobbed into Lydia’s shoulder that night. Lydia hugged her close and kissed her forehead, while Jackson, sitting on the sofa beside them, stared fixedly at the ESPN with the volume turned up so he could pretend not to hear. 

* * *

Her father frowned when he saw Allison’s mask, but he didn’t forbid the costume. Instead, he gave her a wolf’s tail to wear — from a real wolf, he said, not a werewolf. Allison checked. Originally, she’d planned on wearing the tail and mask with gray yoga pants and a matching hoodie, but Lydia had taken one look at them spread out on Allison’s bed, and outright forbade her to come to the party wearing them. 

“Consider this your intervention,” Lydia said on the way to Macy’s. “Your depressed, frumpy, post-break-up look is officially over.” 

Lydia found her a pleated gray miniskirt that Allison knew she’d wear again a million times, and a skimpy, asymmetrical silver top that looked like something Erica Reyes might parade around in. 

“It’s slutty!” Allison protested when Lydia held it up.

Lydia rolled her eyes. “It’s Halloween. If you can’t get away with it now, when can you?”

When Allison tried it on, it made the bones in her shoulders and collarbone pop. She rested her hands on her sharp hips, eyed the pale sliver of stomach exposed by the diagonal hemline. _Wild wolves cull the weakest members of the herd,_ she remembered Gerard telling her. _They go for frail, the sick. That’s why you’ve got to stay strong. Remember who you belong to._ She slumped against the wall of the dressing room, closing her eyes. She wanted to pull on her yoga pants, to curl up in bed and go to sleep.

The dressing room door rattled when Lydia knocked on it. Allison could see her shoes peeking under the door. “How’s it look?” Lydia called.

Allison rolled her head to the side to look at herself in the mirror again. As she did, she caught sight of her purse, tucked into the corner of the bench. She’d been carrying the mask around since she found it at the Halloween store, like Linus with his fucking security blanket. Figuring that she might as well show Lydia the full effect (the pathetic, sad, and lonely full effect), Allison lifted the mask to her face. 

All at once, she felt lean and hungry. Feral. She let the dressing room door swing open. Lydia’s eyes widened, and a slow, honeyed smile spread over her face as she took Allison in. 

“What did I tell you about questioning my fashion advice?” 

Allison growled, nipping at the air in front of her throat. Lydia just laughed, and shoved her into the dressing room. 

“Save it for the party, Big Bad.” 

* * *

Considering that Lydia’s last party ended with mass hallucinations and a werewolf rising from the dead, Allison didn’t have high hopes that many people would turn out for this one. Apparently, she’d underestimated the fact that normal people — those whose lives didn’t involve werewolves — actually looked forward to a little bit of creepiness on Halloween. By ten o’clock, the house and courtyard were packed with zombies, Avengers, and girls in scraps of lingerie so skimpy that Allison’s outfit looked downright prudish in comparison.

By eleven, Allison was half drunk on the bright green witch’s brew that Lydia had concocted. She’d lost track of Lydia half an hour ago, and the last time she’d seen him, Jackson had been happily drinking half of the lacrosse team under the table, not caring a bit about cheating with werewolf stamina now that he was the one doing it. A dance floor had sprung up around the pool, and Allison stalked through it, pretending the swaying bodies, sticky with sweat and spilled drinks, were nothing more than wind-whipped trees. Her tail swayed behind her as she walked, soft fur tickling the backs of her bare thighs until her skin felt electrified and hypersensitive. 

Somebody whistled, and Allison turned, blinking at one of boys from the lacrosse team. He was second line, not one of Jackson’s friends, and dressed like Super Mario. She frowned, trying to remember his name. He waggled his eyebrows at her.

“You can blow my house any time,” he said, reaching for Allison’s waist. Instinct had her spinning into his hold, using his own momentum to send him overbalancing and toppling into the pool. A smatter of cheers and laughter rises from the courtyard. The old Allison would have blushed and fumbled out an apology. Allison the wolf just tossed her hair, lifting her cup in acknowledgment and taking a long, deep drink. 

A glimmer of light in the corner had her turning her head to find Derek Hale in the deep shadows by the fence, his eyes gone red for a moment. He was probably trying to come across as bad-ass and brooding. But with zombified versions of all of the teachers at BHHS staging an improvised Thriller dance in front of him, and Stiles in a Batman costume vomiting into the rosebushes not five feet to his left, Hale just looked grumpy and sad. 

Something tightened in his mouth when he took in her mask and tail. Allison just stared back at him. She wasn’t sure if her expression said, “I still hate you because my mom is dead,” or “I’m sorry my aunt seduced you and murdered your whole family.” She wasn’t sure she cared. Tonight, she decided, Derek Hale was the least of her priorities. Spinning on her heel, Allison turned her back on him and stalked back into the mass of writhing bodies. She’d only taken a few steps before it occurred to her to wonder why Hale was there in the first place. 

Drawing herself up, Allison searched the crowd with more intent. Now that she knew what she was looking for, it was easy enough to find them. Boyd and Erica were swaying together in the moonlight, both of them keeping a wary eye on Allison. Isaac was lying on the roof with some girl, his hands crossed beneath his head as he spoke to her. And Scott was suddenly kneeling in the grass beside Stiles as if he’d been there all along, rubbing his back beneath the cape. 

He glanced up as though sensing Allison’s eyes on him. Their eyes met, and Allison swallowed. Licked her lips.

“Allison!” Lydia called, pushing through the crowd towards her, Jackson in tow. 

She was glowing from the punch, or maybe just happiness, stumbling a little as she crossed the courtyard. 

“There you are!” Lydia half sang, throwing her arms around Allison and planting a lipsticky kiss on her cheek. “You’re my best friend in the whole world!”

Allison turned and caught her hands. Flicking her eyes to Scott and back, Allison pursed her lips at Lydia, the closest she could come to asking permission without actually speaking the words in a crowd full of people who could hear her whisper over the music blasting from the speakers. Glancing mischievously at Jackson, Lydia beamed, and nodded, rising up on her tiptoes as Allison swept her in for a kiss.

Kissing Lydia was nothing like kissing Scott. He’d always kissed Allison like he didn’t trust himself not to break her, curling his claws into the upholstery of her backseat to keep from digging them into her skin. Lydia, though, just dived up into the kiss like she was born for it, all soft curves and slick mouth. They made it as showy as they could around the pointy snout of the wolf mask, licking into each other’s mouths and biting at each other’s lips. By the time they finished, Lydia was giggling drunkenly into Allison’s collarbone, arms wrapped tight around her neck, and one of Allison’s hands had found its way up Lydia’s Red Riding Hood blouse, resting on the satin curve of her breast. 

All around the courtyard, people were laughing, clapping, whistling at them. 

Jackson shook his head as if dazed. “Holy shit!” 

Lydia smirked, tossing her hair. Releasing Allison with a fond peck on the tip of her wolf mask nose, she stumbled back to Jackson, wrapping her arms around his neck. 

“Jealous?” she breathed. Jackson laughed.

“Not even a little.” He kissed her deeply, then came up to look at Allison. His eyebrows lifted in that expression that always managed to be obnoxious and slightly endearing at the same time. “If you don’t have anywhere to be tonight, my bed is big enough for three,” he said.

Lydia giggled, swatting his arm. 

Allison licked her lips, glancing back over her shoulder at Scott. “Actually, I think I have plans,” she said, and started back towards the house. 

* * *

 

Even if Scott didn’t know her scent, the rhythm of her heart would have given her away, fast and skittering against the walls of her ribcage, like hailstones beating against pavement. Allison pushed through the crowded rooms looking for somewhere secluded. Eventually she ended up in a closet in one of the upstairs guest rooms. The kids sprawled across the bed and on the floor were all so wasted that they’d barely noticed her slipping inside. She shut the door behind her and waited, acutely aware of each whisper of the tail against her bare thighs, of the slippery satin top sliding over her nipples. She hadn’t bothered with a bra.

The air in the closet smelled like faded perfume and cedar chips. Allison leaned back into the comforting velvet of an evening coat that must belong to Lydia’s mother. Minutes passed, and the thrill of bravery faded. She wrapped her arms around her chest, wondering what she’d been trying to pull in the courtyard. Scott was probably laughing about her with his friends right now. She touched a hand to her lips, still tingling from Lydia’s kiss. Right now, Allison didn’t feel like a wolf. She didn’t even feel like a hunter. 

When something scratched on the closet door, all the breath rushed out of her. She turned the latch and Scott tumbled inside, wearing a lab coat over a rumpled purple shirt and tweed pants that smelled like mothballs.

“Allison,” he breathed, his eyes wide and nervous. “What are you . . . “

“Shut up!” she snarled. Catching his face between her hands, she kissed him roughly. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!” 

He froze beneath the assault, like he was thinking of pushing her off so they could talk. Scott had always been like that, reaching for the brakes whenever they started moving too quickly, wanting to give Allison an out, to get his wolf under control. Tonight, she wasn’t about to give him the chance. She dragged her lips down his jaw, biting at that spot below his ear that drove him crazy. The wolf mask shifted awkwardly on her face, catching in his hair, and she ripped it off, letting it drift to the ground. His breath hitched, and then his hands were on her hips. She felt the tell-tale scrape of claws through her miniskirt before he could get himself under control. Yes, she thought, and yanked him forward. Her hands tightened in the fabric of his lab coat, and she threw a leg up and around his waist. He stepped forward, his thigh slotting between hers, and yeah, Scott was definitely still into her.

Tears burned suddenly behind her lashes, so she buried her face in his neck to hide them. His hands slid lower, sliding over her skirt before dipping down and under, cupping her ass through her thin cotton panties. She was trembling all over, half delirious from the touch. She bit down, hard, between the junction of his neck and shoulder. For the first time, it bothered her that he couldn’t bruise. She wanted to mark him, to show everyone that he was hers. Together, they wrestled him out of the lab coat, and Allison dove for his shirt buttons, frantic to feel his skin. He pressed his palm against the crotch of her panties, easily finding her swollen clit through the damp cotton. Shuddering, she dragged his head down for another kiss. 

“Do you have . . .?” he whispered, even as his fingers slid past the elastic leg band to the flesh beneath. He pushed two inside her, curving them up, the way she loved. His thumb teased at her clit. Allison whimpered into the curve of his neck before the question caught up with her brain.

“No,” she groaned, because of course she hadn’t thought to bring a condom. Why would she? His fingers were still working inside her, thumb rubbing perfect circles, and she bit her lip, trying to think. “I . . . I could text Lydia. She’ll have one.” In that moment, she was so desperate that she actually would, no matter how much teasing she’d have to endure afterwards. 

Scott made a huffing sound that might have been a laugh, and then his hand withdrew. “Don’t bother,” he said. “I’ve got this.” 

She blinked up at him, wondering why he’d asked if he had a condom with him. Then his hands curved around the backs of her thighs, and he hoisted her up. Gasping in surprise, Allison scrabbled for a hold on the closet wall, her fingers dragging through plastic dry-cleaning bags and old furs. She trusted Scott’s strength to hold her, but it was still hard to balance here, hoisted high against the wall. Thank God that Lydia’s house had high ceilings, otherwise she would have hit her head. 

“Put your legs over my shoulders,” Scott said. Allison did so, dizzily, resting a hand on his head for balance. Then Scott was nuzzling in between her thighs, dragging his teeth over the crotch of her panties. The heat of his mouth made her gasp, and her fingers curled in his hair. She could feel the edge of his fangs through the thin cotton as Scott caught the fabric in his teeth and pulled them away. Then she heard a wet rip, felt the edge of a fang against sensitive skin, and . . .

“Fuck,” she groaned, as he ran the flat of his tongue up and over her, licking her out. His nose bumped against her clit, and Allison heard his deep inhale. He’d always gotten off on the scent, the taste of her. She wondered if it was a werewolf thing, or just a Scott thing, then decided she really didn’t care. He was lifting her hips to get a better angle, rubbing his whole face against the damp, swollen skin of her inner lips, as if he couldn’t get enough of her. When he finally pulled away, it was for just long enough to take a breath. Then he was diving back in, kissing and licking, and sucking as if he’d been starved for it. When she came, knocking her head back against the wall and shuddering against him, Scott groaned into her like he’d felt it himself. 

“Fuck,” he whispered, drawing back for a quick breath. “Allison. You’re so hot.” 

She gripped the back of his head, fingers tangling in his hair. Her toes were curling inside her Ugg boots, her heels digging into his back. Scott was breathing hard against her thigh. He kissed the tip of her clit almost chastely before drawing away. She expected him to set her down, but instead, he followed the kiss with another, then another, sprinkling them like breadcrumbs up her clit and around the folds of her labia. He followed the trail with the tip of his tongue, the touch so light she could barely follow it. 

Then he captured her clit in a second kiss, open-mouthed and filthy. She squirmed against him, aching for more, and he let her take control, holding her up while she rocked and bucked against his tongue, desperate. He’d gone down on her before, but never for this long, and only as a prelude to fucking her. But now he was frantic, whimpering against her. She felt the shape of his jaw shifting, felt the shock of sideburns against her thighs. He licked up inside her, his tongue longer than it was in his human form, and she pressed a hand to her mouth to keep quiet. 

The second orgasm lasted longer than the first, the aftershocks rippling through her. Scott’s face was drenched when he pressed it against her thigh, gasping for breath. He didn’t release her, though, only shifted his hold so she was braced against the wall, pinned by one of his hands.

“I won’t drop you,” he promised, his face human again. She nodded, suddenly teary.

“I know.” 

Then his other hand was coming up, and three of his fingers were pressing inside her. And this, this was what she’d needed, though she hadn’t even realized it. 

“Scott,” she sobbed, and he kissed her thigh before his lips found their way back to her clit. He sucked and licked until she couldn’t stand it anymore, bucking hard against him and tossing her head back and forth against the wall. All the while, his fingers kept moving, pressing hard against that spot inside her, over and over and over again.

She felt the orgasm building inside her, but didn’t expect the flood of wetness when she came. From Scott’s gasp, neither did he. But he moaned appreciatively nonetheless, licking it up. When he finally let her go, she sank down to the floor, too shaky to stand. 

For a second, she could only breathe, feeling like she’d run a marathon. Then her head cleared enough for her to sit up on her knees, reach for his belt. But he caught her hand, stopping her.

When she looked at him, his face was bright, a bit chagrined. 

“No,” he laughed. “I’m good.” Only then did she see the darker fabric around his crotch. Scott shrugged, ducking his chin, and lowered himself to sit on the floor beside her. “You were really, really hot,” he murmured, sounding shy. 

She smiled shakily, and kissed him, licking her own juices from his mouth, his face. They held each other through the afterglow, not speaking. Finally, she peeled away, and pulled the skirt down to cover herself. She pretended not to notice when Scott dabbed his eyes with the sleeve of his lab coat, and he didn’t call her on the panicked tempo of her heart.

He fastened the suspenders back over that ridiculous purple shirt, pulled the lab coat back over his shoulders, awkwardly pulling it closed to hide his damp crotch.

“What are you supposed to be, anyway?” Allison asked.

“I’m Bruce Banner!” he said, and she laughed despite herself.

Scott handed her something. It took her a moment to realize it was the wolf mask. Frowning, she lifted it up, holding it first to her face, and then to his. It looked nothing at all like his real wolf face, and she swallowed, running her thumb over the fur.

“Allison?” Scott asked.

She shook her head. Letting the wolf mask fall to the floor, she stood, still weak-kneed and shaky. She opened the closet door, and stepped out into the guest room beyond. Scott’s eyes glowed amber in the dark light of the closet, but when he stepped out, they warmed to brown. Allison smiled, and took his hand. 

 

The End.

 _Tonight you run in the streets,_  
brave because you wear a mask  
\- Marge Piercy, from “Of pumpkins and ghosts I sing”


End file.
